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Article Excerpt
This paper examines how the concept of "Gulf security" is evolving as internal political and socioeconomic changes in the Gulf states interact with the processes of globalization and the impact of international events in this volatile region. (1) Starting from the basic assumption of "regime security," it first outlines the parameters that guide ruling elites in the six member-states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) in constructing local and regional security agendas. (2) The paper then focuses on a range of current and evolving threats to security to draw the distinction between the "internal" and "external" dimensions of security and how these relate to each other.
Determining which individuals or groups hold the power and responsibility for formulating policy is important in delineating the linkages between internal and external security and deciding which issues do--and do not--dominate security agendas. This is a salient characteristic of ruling elites in the Arab oil monarchies, in which the conduct of foreign and security affairs is restricted to a tightly drawn circle of senior members of the ruling family. (3) Our understanding of regional security-policy formulation is consequently enhanced by taking into account the factors that inform regimes' perceptions of their internal-security matrix. This, in turn, plays a crucial role in shaping their policies towards external issues such as the unfolding post-occupation dynamics in Iraq, the ongoing dispute between Iran and the international community, and the threat posed by radicalism and transnational terrorism.
In addition to the securitization (4) of these particular issues, the second half of this paper examines a number of long-term, non-military challenges to security in the Gulf. It argues that the changing political economies of all six GCC states need to be underpinned by a new and broader approach to national and regional security. Ruling elites' reliance on oil rents and external security guarantees have hitherto provided a powerful insulation from internal problems and demands, while also reflecting the unorthodox nature of "security" in these postcolonial states. (5) Strengthening internal cohesion and creating more inclusive and sustainable polities is vital to overcoming the long-term challenges to security outlined in this paper.
The paper consequently builds on the cognitive shift in thinking about global security that has occurred in an era of accelerating complexity in global interconnections and transnational flows of people, capital and ideas. (6) Transnational terrorism, cross-border criminal networks and flows, and global issues such as climate change have led to the emergence of new threats to national and international security. Increasingly, these bypass the state and erode the Cold War-era demarcations between internal and external spheres as states' monopoly over the legitimate use of force becomes contested by predatory rivals operating within societies and across state boundaries. (7)
EVOLUTION OF GULF SECURITY
The Gulf remains an extremely volatile subregion with multiple and interlinking threats to internal and external security. It did not share in the transformation of security that occurred in Eastern Europe or Latin America during the 1990s. In these regions, security became linked to issues of political and economic legitimacy, and the emergence of new concepts of cooperative security was associated with a shift away from realist approaches predicated on a zero-sum notion of national security. (8) No such comparative shift occurred in the Gulf, which has experienced three major interstate wars based on balance-of-power considerations since 1980. (9)
The conflation of "regime security" with "national security" is a feature of local discourses on security in the Gulf, as it is in many other developing countries. Ruling elites in all six GCC states have pursued hitherto-successful strategies of survival that enabled them to manage the transition into the oil era and retain control over the processes of state formation in the last century. (10) External security alliances, both bilaterally with the United States and multilaterally through the creation of the GCC, met internal needs by reinforcing regimes' security, as much against their own societies as against neighboring states. (11)
The parameters of "Gulf security" in the coming decades will be intertwined with the political and economic opening-up of the region. Four factors will shape the contextual framework within which it will evolve. The first is the impact of the processes of globalization and the revolution in information, communications and technology (ICT). This is creating new forms of private, public and virtual space in which to mobilize, organize and channel participatory demands. (12) Globalization has also enmeshed the Gulf within a wider interconnected region with multiple sources of actual or potential insecurity. These include the intellectual and radicalization linkages emanating within and flowing from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the impact of progressive state contraction and ungoverned spaces in Somalia and Yemen and their implications for maritime security, and the threat of nuclear proliferation in Iran and Pakistan.
This links to the second factor, the growing internationalization of the Gulf and its emergence as the center of gravity in the Middle East by virtue of its economic and financial resources. The rapid expansion of economic and political links with China, India and Russia is creating new strategic linkages that are shifting the international relations of the region in subtle ways. (13) Indian President Manmohan Singh visited the Gulf in November 2008 and announced that India viewed the Gulf as an intrinsic part of its broader neighborhood. Significantly, India also signed defense cooperation agreements with both Qatar and Oman on maritime security, the sharing of data and common threat perceptions. (14) Meanwhile China, in its tenth Five Year Plan (2001-05), referred to energy security for the first time and has constructed a naval base at the Pakistani port of Gwadur, close to the mouth of the Strait of Hormuz.
Issues of energy dependence and security of access to regional resources give external powers a stake in regional security structures. International reactions to the outbreak of piracy in the Gulf of Aden during 2008 may prove a harbinger of future policy trends. The European Union launched its first-ever naval mission (Operation Atlantis), while both China and India reacted with a more muscular deployment of naval forces to protect their own maritime security interests. As the Gulf's share of global oil and natural-gas production is projected to increase from 28 percent in 2000 to 33 percent in 2020, with most of that increase going to Asia, its strategic significance will only increase, together with the number of external powers holding a stake in regional affairs. (15)
Oil (and, more recently, natural gas) is therefore the third factor that both explains international interest in the Gulf and frames the challenges facing its political and economic evolution. These reserves are not distributed evenly throughout the Gulf, and pockets of energy poverty and reliance on imported natural gas (primarily from Qatar) have already emerged. (16) This distinction will play a crucial role in shaping regional development and potential sources of tension and insecurity in the future. At 2006 production rates, and barring unexpected new discoveries, Bahrain, Oman and Yemen are projected to deplete their existing oil reserves by 2025 and consequently face imminent transitions to post-oil states. This contrasts sharply with the other Gulf states, which do not face the same challenges of resource depletion as their reserves-production ratio is a projected 62.8 years (Qatar), 69.5 years (Saudi Arabia) and 91.9 years (United Arab Emirates). (17)
Given the centrality of oil revenues in constructing and maintaining the social contract and redistributive mechanisms that bind state-society relations in rentier systems, any changes in the domestic political economies of resource distribution will pose great challenges to security and stability in states of transition. Comparative political science suggests that redistributive states are especially vulnerable to erosion of the ruling bargain and consequent loss of regime legitimacy, if mechanisms for co-opting support and depoliticizing society begin to break down. (18) One prominent academic critic in Bahrain stated bluntly, "The future is very bleak. The system must change or transform itself." Otherwise, "without oil, there is no future." (19)
The fourth contextual factor is the continuing lack of internal consensus within the GCC itself. The GCC was established in 1981 as a political and security bulwark against revolutionary Iran. Lingering intraregional disputes and fears of Saudi hegemony on the part of the smaller member-states have hampered progress towards security cooperation, which has lagged behind economic integration. The six member-states have been unable to agree on the nature and extent of the threats posed by Iran and Yemen, thereby making it virtually impossible to adopt a regional approach to these issues. (20) Most significantly, each member-state has been integrated under the U.S. security umbrella on a bilateral basis. This strategic reality is unlikely to change in the foreseeable future and complicates any moves towards regional security cooperation.
SECURITIZATION OF CURRENT THREATS
GCC responses to the territorially bounded issues of Iraq and Iran and the intellectual challenge of transnational terrorism illustrate their awareness of the linkages between internal and external security. These interconnections have been magnified by the explosion of Arab satellite television channels and internet websites, which have accelerated the spread of transnational linkages while contributing to the creation of an Arab "imagined community." (21) Accordingly, regimes have construed these issues more as threats to their political and popular legitimacy than to their material security, and this has guided their formulation of policy to meet the challenges.
With the steady drawdown of American, British and Australian troops from Iraq ahead of the December 2011 deadline for full withdrawal, attention is turning to how the post-occupation dynamics of Iraq and its future political trajectory will affect regional security structures and threat perceptions. Thus far, the GCC states have managed to minimize their exposure to the many sources of insecurity within Iraq, such as sectarian conflict, terrorism and large-scale refugee flows. (22) This does not mean that regional policy makers believe the security threat from Iraq has disappeared; the problem of integrating Iraq into the regional fold remains unresolved. (23)
Since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, regional and international discourse on Iraq has been dominated by analysis of its geopolitical and strategic...
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